The Aga Khan has flown to Ireland with members of his family to meet the Queen and will host a a private lunch in her honour after a tour of the stud farm.

Royal guest will slip off to visit top racehorses
Irish Independent
The Queen, a noted horsewoman, will take a detour from her official itinerary to meet Sea The Stars at the Aga Khan's Gilltown stud in Kilcullen, Co Kildare, on Thursday. She will visit Coolmore, the world's largest horse-breeding operation, ...
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By MAEVE SHEEHAN

Sunday May 15 2011
QUEEN Elizabeth II will slip away from her official itinerary for private encounters with some of the country's championship racehorses.
The Queen, a noted horsewoman, will take a detour from her official itinerary to meet Sea The Stars at the Aga Khan's Gilltown stud in Kilcullen, Co Kildare, on Thursday. She will visit Coolmore, the world's largest horse-breeding operation, in Fethard, Co Tipperary, the following day.

As a noted horse breeder and owner of a stable of winners, she is said to have a huge interest in Sea The Stars, who started life in the Curragh and became one of the Europe's greatest racehorses.
The Aga Khan has flown to Ireland with members of his family to meet the Queen and will host a a private lunch in her honour after a tour of the stud farm.

She will also dine at Coolmore, after touring the stud farm with racing magnate John Magnier and a list of notables from the horse-racing industry. The guest lists in both cases remain a closely guarded secret.
Roads in both villages will effectively be shut down while she visits the stud farms.

The security operation accompanying the royal visit is the biggest in garda history, with more than 8,000 gardai -- almost two-thirds of the force -- and 2,000 soldiers deployed to protect the royal party during her four day tour.

According to the Queen's official itinerary, she will take in Dublin's Garden of Remembrance and Memorial Park at Islandbridge; the Guinness brewery; Trinity College; Aras an Uachtarain; Croke Park and Dublin Castle.

She will travel to the National Stud in Kildare, before returning for a British Embassy party at the National Convention Centre.

The party will then set off for St Patrick's Rock in Cashel, followed by the English market and the Tyndall Institute in Cork. She will fly out of Cork Airport on Friday.
The threat from dissident republicans has meant that the security for the Queen's visit will be even more intense than for the visit of President Barack Obama.

More than 5,000 manholes and drains along the royal route have been sealed and thousands of lamp-posts secured. It is believed that the Queen will spend at least one night in Farmleigh House in the Phoenix Park, which has necessitated heavy security along the city quays.
This weekend, garda specialist units and the Defence Forces were clearly visible taking up positions along rooftops and on strategic points along the route.

The Queen will arrive in Ireland with her own security detail of up 40 to 50 royal-protection officers.

In addition, around 250 members of the gardai's special detective unit will be working around the clock, accompanying the Queen on every step of her journey. Their orders are to stay as close to her as possible.
More than 50 members of the elite, armed Emergency Response Unit will be the Queen's heavily armed outriders, trained in close protection and 'counter-sniper' capability.

A handful of top gardai and military personel have worked on nothing else but the royal visit for weeks.

While Commissioner Martin Callinan is the ultimate boss, Deputy Commissioner Noirin O'Sullivan will head the operation, along with Assistant Commissioner John O'Mahony.
- MAEVE SHEEHAN

Royal visit to home of Sea The Stars to reflect long-standing interest in the turf

BRIAN O'CONNOR, Racing Correspondent

GILLTOWN TRIP: DURING A tumultuous 2009 season that propelled him to legendary status, Sea The Stars was described by his trainer John Oxx as the culmination of 300 years of thoroughbred breeding.

So royalty of the equine and human variety will meet when Queen Elizabeth travels to Co Kildare to see the great horse today.

Coming to the end of his second season as an €85,000 a cover stallion at Gilltown Stud, Sea The Stars will be visited by the Queen, whose trip to the stud farm situated outside Kilcullen will be hosted by owner the Aga Khan.

It will be the latest meeting of the royals who have enjoyed a long relationship, with the Queen having bestowed the “His Highness” title on the Aga Khan in 1957.

The Aga Khan is the spiritual leader of some 15 million Ismaili Muslims of the Shia faith scattered around the world.

The Queen’s passion for the racing and breeding industries has been a feature of her reign. She owns the favourite for next month’s Epsom Derby, Carlton House, who won the Dante Stakes impressively at York last week. The Derby is the one English classic race the Queen has yet to win.

In contrast, the Aga Khan has won the Derby on four occasions, just one less than his grandfather, the third Aga Khan, who established an extensive breeding empire in Ireland in the 1920s. Gilltown was one of six studs inherited by the current Aga but he sold it in 1974 before buying it back 18 years later. He owns four studs in Ireland.

The Aga Khan no longer owns Ballymany Stud on the edge of the Curragh from where his most famous horse, 1981 Derby winner Shergar, was kidnapped in 1983. Despite that blow, the Aga Khan has expanded his racing interests in Ireland in recent decades and has a large number of horses in training here with John Oxx and Michael Halford.

Johnny Murtagh is his retained jockey in the Republic.

His generosity to the racing industry in Ireland was emphasised in 2003 when he bought a hotel at the back of the stands at the Curragh and gifted it to the Turf Club to allow an extensive €100 million facelift of the famous racecourse.

The gesture cost the Aga Khan a reputed €15 million.

However, prolonged planning difficulties with the project repeatedly delayed construction and by the time the go-ahead was finally given by the authorities, the bottom had fallen out of the Irish economy.

There is a long history between the British royal family and the Aga Khan’s and much of it revolves around horses. When the then princess Elizabeth married Philip Mountbatten in November 1947, the third Aga Khan gave her a filly by Turkhan, out of Hastra, which she called Astrakhan.

In 2008, the Queen hosted a dinner at Buckingham Palace to celebrate the Golden Jubilee of the Aga Khan’s accession to the title. Reports indicate that horses and racing have been known to dominate conversation between the two and the bloodstock on view today will give them much to talk about.

The Aga Khan stands two stallions he bred himself, the Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe winner Dalakhani, and Azamour, at Gilltown. He also beat off competition from around the world to stand Sea The Stars when that superstar horse was retired.

There is also an extensive band of broodmares at Gilltown.

The Queen’s broodmare operation isn’t as extensive but she holds the upper hand this year with Carlton House among the leading lights of his generation. But whether he will be as good as Sea The Stars is debatable!

The Irish National Stud in Kildare has produced some of the country's preeminent thoroughbreds.

The Queen's cavalcade will then travel to Gilltown stud in Kilcullen, where she will be given a guided tour and meet one of the greatest racehorses of all-time, Sea the Stars.

The stud is owned by the Aga Khan and he will host a special private reception for the Queen before she makes her way back to Dublin.

Later this evening a gala dinner, concert and fashion show in the Queen's honour will be held at Dublin's Convention Centre.

Mary Byrne, Westlife and the Chieftans are among those who perform and there will be a showcase of fashion from some of Ireland's leading designers including Louise Kennedy and John Rocha.

Last night the monarch offered her deep sympathy to everyone who has suffered in centuries of conflict between Britain and Ireland.

In a moving address in Dublin Castle she spoke of the painful legacy of the past and the need to remember all those whose lives have been affected.

She said the relationship had not always been straightforward but stopped short of delivering an apology for Britain’s actions in Ireland, saying looking back both nations could have acted differently.

The Queen, whose cousin Lord Mountbatten was blown up by the IRA off the Co Sligo coast in 1979, said: “It is a sad and regrettable reality that through history our islands have experienced more than their fair share of heartache, turbulence and loss.

“These events have touched us all, many of us personally, and are a painful legacy. We can never forget those who have died or been injured or their families.

“To all those who have suffered as a consequence of our troubled past I extend my sincere thoughts and deep sympathy.”

President Mary McAleese said a new chapter of partnership and friendship had opened between the two countries.

She added the visit is the culmination of the success of the peace process in the North.

She said: “This evening we celebrate a new chapter in our relationship that may still be a work in progress, but happily has also become a work of progress, of partnership and friendship.”

She described the past as a repository of bitterness but hoped the future could be different.

“I am particularly proud of this island’s peacemakers who having experienced first hand the appalling, toxic harvest of failing to resolve old hatreds and political differences, rejected the perennial culture of conflict and compromised enough to let a new future in,” she said.

The Queen’s speech came midway through her state visit here during which she laid separate wreaths in honour of the men and women who died fighting the British for independence and for the 49,000 Irish soldiers killed in the First World War. The ceremonies took place at the Garden of Remembrance in Dublin and the Islandbridge National War Memorial.

Dissident republicans protested as she was on her feet, but police kept them well away from Dublin Castle where the 172 guests included politicians and churchmen on all sides in the North and the Republic. The only party not represented was Sinn Féin.

Taoiseach Enda Kenny and British Prime Minister David Cameron were among the guests who also included the North's First Minister Peter Robinson.

He was accompanied by his wife Iris, the disgraced MP who resigned after admitting to an affair with a teenage lover. It was her first public appearance in 15 months.

Celebrities included Ireland rugby captain Brian O’Driscoll and his actress wife Amy Huberman, who also were invited to the glittering royal wedding of Prince William.

ONE of racing's top stallions died just hours before he was due to be inspected by horse- lover Queen Elizabeth. Verglas had been standing as a sire at the National Stud in Kildare town for the past six years.

But he died as a result of an accident on Tuesday as he was being prepared for the visit of the queen and Prince Philip this morning.

Verglas was one of eight stallions at the National Stud, with a fee of €10,000 per service. He was one of the top 10 Irish-based sires of 2010.

Stud chief executive John Osborne said last night that it was with great sadness he confirmed the death of Verglas, "one of our most popular stallions". "Staff are distraught at the news, which followed a tragic accident during the normal course of business," Mr Osborne said.

"Along with Invincible Spirit, Amadeus Wolf and Jeremy, he was among our top stallions and has left behind him an incredible legacy of wins."

Born in 1994, Verglas had been with the National Stud since 2005 and had been previously based in France. During his racing career, he was trained on the Curragh by Kevin Prendergast, and then moved to Charlie Whittingham in the US.

As part of the queen's visit this morning, it was intended that all of the stud's stallions, including Verglas, be put on parade.

A small group of guests, including representatives of the horseracing industry, have been invited to the stud for the visit, which is expected to last about half an hour.

The queen will then be taken by road across the Curragh to Gilltown Stud, outside Kilcullen, where the owner, the Aga Khan, will host a private reception, lasting a couple of hours.

While in Gilltown it is expected that the queen will exchange views with the Aga Khan on the likely winners of the flat racing classics this year.

A keen breeder, the queen is hoping to win the Epsom Derby for the first time next month when her colt, Carlton House, is likely to start as favourite.

The Aga Khan is hoping that his luck will hold at the weekend when his filly Emiyna will be one of the favourites to win the 1,000 Guineas at the Curragh on Sunday.

The queen will then return by road to Dublin. Hundreds of troops are being deployed to back up gardai providing protection for her cavalcade along the N7 and on minor roads across the Curragh.

Aerial support will be provided by the Garda Defender plane and an EC-135 helicopter.

The Army will also deploy its anti-missile and surveillance radar equipment at the Curragh.

The massive security operation is being spearheaded by the regional commander in the east, Assistant Garda Commissioner Dermot Jennings.